Hi! I'm Courtney, the owner of Merriment Events™ in Richmond, Virginia. The Merriment Blog is a place where I can share ideas that are inspiring me. I'd love to hear from you! Please get in touch by writing to courtney {at} merrimentevents {dot} com

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I have a friend out of town who is planning her wedding, and she picks my brain by text message from time to time. I love to help her and think of it as an extra little gift I’m giving her for her wedding. Recently one of her questions was this: who issues the wedding invitation? Specifically, if you have stepparents, are their names included on the host line?

The answer to the first question, “who issues the wedding invitation,” is this: either you and your fiancée, you and your fiancée with your parents, or your parents issue the invitation.

To the second question, “are stepparents included?” Stepparents are traditionally not included on the host line. Of course there are exceptions (the death of a parent, a stepparent becoming an adoptive parent, etc.), but in straightforward circumstances where you have a set of divorced parents co-hosting a wedding, only their names are listed on the invitation. Easy enough, right? Not always. A lot of emotions come up during wedding planning, and often those show up when the wedding invitation is being drafted. Ultimately etiquette exists to help people be gracious to one another and to provide some sort of social norm. If etiquette is telling you to do something that is going to hurt a close family member, deviate! However, if your family and your circle of friends prefers tradition and are comfortable with the standard rules regarding wedding invitation text, you’d likely refer to the guidelines below. My favorite resource for topics like this is The Wedding Blue Book by Crane & Co. I can’t recommend it highly enough!

A few options:

The first is the most traditional, where the invitation is issued from a set of divorced parents. The mother is remarried. In this case, the parents are hosting the event:

Ms. Jane Doe (mother)

Mr. John Smith (father)

request the honor of your presence

at the marriage of their daughter…

The second example below is where the invitation is issued from the couple with their families. The couple and the parents are hosting the event together:

Together with their families

Bride’s name

and

Groom’s name

request the honor of your presence

at their marriage…

The third example below is where the bride and groom are hosting the wedding and issuing the invitation:

Bride’s name

and

Groom’s name

request the honor of your presence

at their marriage

There are many specific cases (widowed bride, divorced bride) that would change the wording above, but traditionally, these are the formats we see most often.

The line “request the honor” indicates that the ceremony will take place in a house of worship. You can also use the English spelling “honour” to inject more formality into your invitation. If you were not being married in a house of worship, you would use the line “request the pleasure of your company,” as in the image above taken by Katie Stoops for a shoot we did at Tuckahoe Plantation for Southern Weddings Magazine. The invitation was designed by The Lettered Olive.

Wedding invitations should be mailed six to eight weeks before the date. Before mailing yours, be sure you’ve completed these last few tasks.

1. Budget a month to complete invitation assembly and addressing. Often we work with calligraphers who are out of town, so we’re sure to build time into our schedule for shipping envelopes back and forth. You may not be using a calligrapher; beautiful handwriting is just fine. Whatever method you’re using, you will need about a month to address, assemble and mail.

2. Proof read your address list, and always remember to spell it out. State names, street quadrants (“northwest”), the word “apartment,” suffixes, such as “junior,” should all be spelled out, not abbreviated.

3. Assemble your suite. Your invitation will be on the bottom, face side up, with enclosures, organized largest to smallest, on top of the invitation. The response card should be tucked into its stamped return envelope, print side up. Typically the order is: wedding invitation, reception card, reply card in envelope. You may have more enclosures. Order them by size.

4. Weigh one complete invitation set at the post office to be sure you’re using the correct postage.

5. Make sure all of your response card envelopes are stamped with return postage. Bonus points: number response cards so you know who they belong to in case a guest forgets to write her name.

You’re nearly finished! You’ve approved your invitation design, materials will soon go to print, and envelopes are on their way to your calligrapher. Next up: sending a properly formatted address list to your calligrapher.

Although the calligrapher with whom you’re working may have her own system and requirements, over the years we’ve noticed some standard requirements as it pertains to address list formatting:

1. Send a typed list in a word document, not a spreadsheet

2. The list should be in address label format, as below, max three columns

3. Use a legible font, such as Times New Roman, 12 pt

4. Alphabetize your list

5. If you have changes or updates to addresses after the initial list has been sent to your calligrapher, send changes and updates by email. Do not send a new, revised list. Updated drafts cause confusion.

I had the good fortune of discovering Claire Hill’s work last year at Fraîche, where her Richmond prints are sold (second image from the top). Claire has been an artist for as long as she can remember. After earning a BFA with a concentration in painting, she returned to her hometown of Richmond, where she has focused on producing custom pen & ink architectural drawings, paintings, portraits and custom calligraphy & illustration for weddings. Of her wedding work, Claire says custom invitations with illustrations are her favorite kind of commission because “they are more fun and leave a lot of room for creative freedom!” I just love all of the details Claire incorporates into her work, giving each piece a unmistakable sense of place — the dogwoods, cardinals and architectural elements. And the energy and happiness of her calligraphy is contagious! Thanks for sharing your work, Claire! xo

It was such a joy to help one of our nearest and dearest plan her wedding, which took place on a chilly day last November at Tuckahoe Plantation. Brittany has worked with me for more than five years as my lead production assistant, and as you might expect we’ve been planning her wedding for some time. (Maybe before she found the groom? shhh!) To see more of the details and get the full scoop, pop over to Martha Stewart Weddings!

There are so many fun ways to present guestbooks at receptions, but one of our favorite ways to capture the names of guests in attendance is the Quaker-style wedding certificate. It’s better than many other versions of the guest book, in our opinion, because it can be framed and admired for years to come.

There are many ways to design a wedding certificate, from the very traditional, where the vows, date and wedding location are listed, to more modern versions that may only list the bride and groom’s names at the top in a decorative manner along with a quote or poem.

No matter how you choose to embellish your certificate, there are a few things that are standard certificate to certificate. Two lines are typically reserved at the top of the page for the bride and groom. Since in the Quaker tradition, the bride and groom marry one another in the presence of friends and family, there would not be a line for the minister on a true Quaker certificate, but you could add that line to yours just beneath the bride and groom’s signature lines. General signature lines follow and are often introduced by copy that reads, “as witnessed by our friends and family,” or some version thereof.

The design of the certificate above included details that were sentimental for the bride and groom: Montauk daisies to remind the bride of where she grew up and to nod to the groom’s proposal and dogwood blossoms for Virginia, where their wedding took place. It’s those sort of sentimental details that mean so much. Below, guests sign Alex and Paul’s certificate at their outdoor reception at Maymont.

I’m adoring the wallpaper story in the current issue of Martha Stewart Weddings, but I’m a total wallpaper junkie. Every surface in my house would be covered in paper if I had my way. Whether you’re interested in adding a bit of pattern to your invitations, creating a backdrop for a photo booth, lining serving trays, creating a unique escort card display, making drink flags or backing programs, vintage and modern wallpapers offer myriad ways to personalize the design elements of your event. There are literally thousands of ways to use patterned paper! And the great thing about wallpaper is that one roll will really go a long way toward all of your paper projects.